The only thing I knew about the trip before setting sail was
that I ought to dress in layers because it gets cold out on the open ocean. A
week before shoving off, I had showed up late to the meeting in which the
organizers of the Oceanids’ and International Club’s annual trip brief
participants on the natural history of the Gray Whale. I already knew enough
from a marine biology class to know the species spends August in Alaska to feed
and January in Baja to mate or give birth, passing by San Diego along the way.
So after showing up at the meeting to find everyone else gone, my two questions
for the organizers were where to sign up and if very large cameras were allowed
on the boat.
A half-hour before leaving dry land, I was cursing Mission
Bay for making my vessel so obscure. I drove past the boat three times, missing
it in the stretches of masts and sails that line the artificial harbor. With
the scheduled departure time just a few minutes away, I took a guess as to
where I ought to be, parked my car and was relieved to find half the group
still waiting to board.
Our boat, the New Seaforth, was a decent size — big enough
to comfortably hold the 130 or so people I had heard the crew count off. The
number of seats was fewer than travelers, though. The railing, I imagined, was
low enough for my center of gravity to allow me to flip over the side should a
rogue wave come along. I walked the perimeter looking for anything interesting,
and I was satisfied to find I had the largest lens of anyone with a camera.
The real stragglers showed up with not a minute to spare,
communicating via cell phone to friends on board in order to make sure the boat
would not leave without them. It made for reunions that would have been
touching, had I not been anxiously ready to get on with the whale watching. My
impatience subsided as we passed the jetty and I felt the cool wind of the
Pacific.
The sea was too choppy for pictures through a long lens, so
I used a wide angle to work the boat, picking out foreigners pouring over cell
phones and other attendees that were poorly dressed for maritime activities.
The impression I got was of a floating city bus, and with some enthusiastic
watchers dressed to the hilt, they had the appearance of homeless people.
When we had been out on the open water for maybe half an
hour and already seen a small group of common dolphins, I was worried that the
ride would not smooth out enough for me to be able to use my trusty telephoto.
The captain’s voice came on over external speakers, advising us to just bend
over the rail should we need to throw up. I was thankful that I didn’t get
seasick, although I was still careful. Looking through a camera can amplify the
feeling of the world sloshing around beneath your feet and make even the
strongest stomachs turn. Sure enough, a friend of mine who by chance had taken
the same boat could not take any pictures for want of Dramamine.
It was a great relief when the boat slowed down once we had
come across a whale. A young Japanese man was the first to spot it, shouting
what I presume might mean, “I see a whale and am quite excited about it!” The
group rushed to the right rail of the boat, making her tilt slightly to that
side. Despite the crush of onlookers and the boat’s jarring rhythm, I shot a
few frames of what was probably a male gray whale as its tail lifted out of the
water, signifying that it had taken enough breaths and was headed back down to
the depths. Its distance from the boat was so great that even though its body
could have been 45 feet long, its flukes were only a small black mark in my
photographs. But it was what I came for, and even though the whale was only
visible for a few seconds, I had gotten my shot and was satisfied. I wondered
what the journey could possibly mean to the other people on the boat, with no
photo to take and only a memory to bring back to the harbor.
I looked at my cell phone to see what time it was. We still
had an hour out at sea. A sea lion was tagging along with the boat, making
turns under the hull and coming up on either side. With it were a pelican and a
cormorant, waiting for a few morsels to fall overboard.
For the moment, I wasn’t bothered by the human intrusion
into the natural environment that brought these animals together, and passed
the time by taking pictures of the unnatural trio.
We saw a couple more whales that afternoon, but for me the
magic was lost after the first sighting; I didn’t get any good photos of the
later whales anyway. When we made land I took account of the soreness in my
legs and feet from keeping myself steady for hours on end. I licked my lips,
felt my salty sunburned skin and tried to pat down my wind-blown hair. I was
tired. It was all worth it, though, even just for those few moments when I saw
the tail of a whale.